but a dropped matchbook points to the lair of the mysterious chuck borgia...

***

“hey, has anybody seen chuck borgia? chuck borgia, from chicago?”

every year there was a “big fight”, somewhere on earth, usually in some place like stalingrad or johannesburg or montivideo. and the biggest hoods and gangsters from all over the world came to see it and each other and make deals and have a good time.

although there was no official “truce”, it was understood that peace prevailed and that out and out warfare and gunplay were off limits, until the gathering broke up and everybody went back to their own territory.

and usually everybody showed up. it was considered rude not to.

so when tommy the toad, from syracuse, asked muskrat phil geronimo, from palermo, and eddie chang, from macao, as the trio sat in lulu johnson’s lounge in stalingrad, if anybody had seen chuck borgia, he did not get much of a response.

“he’s got to be around here somewhere,” said phil.

“sure,” added eddie, “after all, it’s his local kid who’s fighting. he’s probably being asked a million questions about him.”

“no doubt he can,” repled phil. “but that ain’t the point. it shows a certain - a certain lack of character. and it ain’t right.”

“no, it ain’t ,” tommy agreed.

“it violates the spirit of the occasion.” phil warmed to his theme. “everybody is here to have a good time. who wants to have a gun go off in their ear, or get somebody’s blood or brains all over their nice new suit that they bought especially for the occasion?”

“you might as well not even have a big fight,” eddie added.

tommy finished his bourbon and water. “ah, forget it. let’s have another drink. this round’s mine.”

*

“the guys will be extra alert, red. you can count on it.”

“extra? extra compared to what? they weren’t alert before? what are they there for, if they ain’t alert?”

“come on red, don’t talk like some lawyer. you know what i mean.” charlie “the cowboy” callahan looked around the suite red fuller had booked on the top floor of the stalingrad ambassador hotel, where a quick confab of red’s boys had been called.

“do i? ” red asked.

“we’ve always backed you up before, haven’t we?” charlie asked, raising his eyebrows. what he didn’t have to say - what everybody in the room understood was - “we backed you against packy miller, didn’t we?”

red just grunted in reply. he poured himself some more vodka from the bottle in his hand.

“it’s lucky,” charlie continued in a more relaxed tone, “that we’re here on the top floor. we don’t have as many exits to cover.”

“lucky? what’s lucky about it? you think i was going to be someplace besides on the top floor? wherever i go? where else would i be?”

charlie laughed. “sure. what was i thinking?”

“and besides,” red continued, “ we are not going to stay cooped up in here. we got to make the rounds, show our faces, just like nothing is happening.”

“of course, red, of course.”

red turned to “chicago jimmy” kelly, the young fighter, who was sitting by himself in a corner, wearing the sharpest suit in the room.

“how about you, kid? what do you think about all this?”

the kid punched the air a few times. “i’m just going to fight my fight, red. what else can i do?”

“that’s right. you guys hear that? the kid’s got the right attitude. you should all have that attitude.”

“look here,” put in “doc” polanski, who had been sitting down doing a crossword puzzle, “you know chuck borgia isn’t doing himself any favors with this nonsense. nobody - and i mean nobody - is saying anything good about him, all on account of this.”

“that’s right,” added willie “the weeper” wattleback, “solly solomon, from the east side of london, has been particularly vocal in his displeasure. and so has the big frenchman. ”

“that’s great,” red agreed. “just great. that and ten kopecks will get me a cup of the lousy russian coffee they got in this hotel.”